


Unsaid Words

by Lefaym



Category: Doctor Who, Torchwood
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-03-26
Updated: 2008-03-26
Packaged: 2017-10-08 02:48:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/71903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lefaym/pseuds/Lefaym
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"After almost one hundred and forty years, those words still rattled in the corners of Jack's mind like a half-forgotten prayer."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unsaid Words

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to hel_bee on LJ for the beta.

_"I came back for you."_

After almost one hundred and forty years, those words still rattled in the corners of Jack's mind like a half-forgotten prayer.

They were there when he died. They were there every time he drew that first painful breath when he came back to life. They were there in his dreams, on the rare occasions that he slept. In those dreams, he had no need to search for the Doctor. In those dreams, the Doctor found him first.

_"I came back for you."_

They rattled even after Jack found him. They persisted even when Jack knew, for certain, that he would never hear them spoken; that the Doctor would run to the end of the universe before he would say those words.

******  
******

On the Valiant, he tried to block the words from his mind, focussing instead on the chains that dug into his wrists; on the way that Tish would kiss him when it all became too much for her; on Martha alone and afraid, but strong. When that became too hard, he'd try to anchor himself to the life he'd known-- the life that he'd almost come to love-- before he found the Doctor again.

Sometimes it would be Tosh or Owen that his mind would fix upon. Tosh, staring intently at her monitor, so absorbed that she didn't even notice the lonely sighs that would escape her lips; Owen, making some biting remark to hide the emptiness inside. More often though, it was Ianto and Gwen who haunted him and kept him sane: Ianto and Gwen who, separately, had sought him out; Ianto and Gwen who wouldn't give up until they had found him, and planted themselves beneath his skin. He'd remember Gwen's gap toothed smile and her stubborn glare. He'd remember the sound that Ianto made the first time they came together, when Jack had taken it upon himself to teach the younger man that sometimes sex could be used to escape the pain.

He'd think of them, and he'd lose himself just for a moment-- and then he'd remember that he'd left them too; left them like the Doctor had left him.

And then the words that he would never hear also became the words he feared he would never be able to say.

_"I came back for you."_

******  
******

Later, when time had been undone and remade, Jack found himself alone in the TARDIS, in a bedroom of sorts. He lay on top of the sheets, staring at the curved ceiling until the exhaustion of a year that never happened lulled him into a rare slumber.

He wasn't sure if he was dreaming, at first, when he woke to find the Doctor standing against the wall opposite him, smelling of smoke and tears and eternity.

"Jack," he said hoarsely.

Jack rose slowly, and brought himself face to face with the man who had left him so long ago.

"Jack," he repeated, and Jack raised his hand to the Doctor's cheek. "Tell me that I'm not alone."

But Jack couldn't. Not when he'd spent so long waiting for words that would never come.

"Please."

And because he couldn't deny him completely, not when the Doctor had come to him so vulnerable and unguarded, Jack kissed him.

The world dissolved for a moment then, as though all of time was readjusting itself. When Jack found himself whole again, the Doctor was responding with a gentle urgency, slowly guiding him backwards until he was sitting on the bed, the Doctor beside him. He pressed his lips against Jack's for a second time, and whispered, "Tell me."

"I can't."

The Doctor's unsaid words clogged Jack's throat, and Jack remembered that he owed those words to others now.

The Doctor pulled back from him. "I'm sorry, Jack; I can't do this."

******  
******

The next day the Doctor said that it didn't matter. "Come with me," he said.

When he refused, Jack wondered if his own unspoken words would now haunt the Doctor through the centuries. As he left, he made a comment about his vanity and his childhood, hoping that the Doctor would read something more into his flippant remarks; a promise that he'd say it one day, even if he couldn't now.

When he finally returned to the Hub, Ianto asked, "Are you going back to him?" and Jack saw himself in the younger man's eyes.

He felt like he was exorcising a ghost when he said, "I came back for you."


End file.
